determining source content

[keoni]

Not to bury the lead: In my opinion, they way the user interface displays the content of a harvestable source is awkward at best, and for me often quite frustrating. Rather than just complain about it, I have a solution that should be relatively simple for the devs to implement.

The Problem: If you harvest much, you're aware that each source has four colored bars - source time, content, life, and stability. Even though source time and content are variable (with source time under your control if you prospected the source, but content out of your control and random), all the bars are scaled so that they are completely "full" to begin with. For whatever reason they opted to do this, it means you can not tell at a glance which sources have greater or lesser content - and that's important to know, especially as you gain skill in harvest and can pull more from each source. The only way to display that value is to carefully mouse over that one bar. I say "carefully" because if your mouse is slightly above or below that one line, you will simply get a helpful (not) reminder that the white line is the [source time] and the red line is the [source life]. This gets increasingly frustrating as you are able to pop more sources at once, so other elements of other source windows overlap, so you may have to free mouse to change your viewing angle just to get an unobstructed mouseover. Effectively, even though data on source content is not intended to be hidden, the user interface for accessing that data is so astoundingly awkward that I can't make any use of that data. And so, far too often, I've exhausted the low content of some pitiful source, and I sit there waiting for the source time to tick to zero so i can move on to the next dig, even though I may have had a 22 content and a 28 content source right nearby, but I had no way to determine that in a reasonable time frame. Fortunately...it doesn't have to be that way.

Proposed Solution: This is really simple, straightforward, and powerful. Just add a new element to the name of the source, showing the content of that source. So, where now it may read "Raw Material Source [Keoni]" revise this to add "Raw Material Source [Keoni] [24]" - where 24 is the source content for that particular source. By adding this one key piece of data to the source label, it would allow savvy harvesters to take advantage of this through targetting macros. Some people are still upset at losing the ability to select sources with the space bar - if you give them the ability to instantly target the source with the greatest content of those available, that should heal those wounds completely.

So - harvesters of the living planet, unite! If the devs give us this change, I'll post a targetting macro here everyone can use or modify to their way of digging.

[alibasil]

I agree, the bars work on a percentage scale which can be a little tedious when searching for the greater content.

I find that when i hover the mouse i have to find a window with no sources directly behind it and none infront of it. Then i have the mouse hovering between source content and source life to determine the content (works for me).

If there is a source begind the window i have to move my camera angle or character position until its clear and i can determine the content. This is the main frustration for me. Thank god for cone angle, if the sources were all tightly packed together (which they can be sometimes) I would just dig the source without bothering to look.

I believe that if this "determining step" was made easier, we wouldn't have to make it as blunt and straight forward as Keoni's suggestion (although it is a good one)

[geezas]

Would love something like that

Digging from a source with 10 is so frustrating when you know you can get 22 out of it. The mouse hovering and runnig back and forth, using the cam, stepping sideway's etc to get the content numer to pop is so tedious that I've just given up.

Thumbs up! I want to see this ingame

[blaah]

Originally Posted by keoni

Proposed Solution: This is really simple, straightforward, and powerful. Just add a new element to the name of the source, showing the content of that source. So, where now it may read "Raw Material Source [Keoni]" revise this to add "Raw Material Source [Keoni] [24]" - where 24 is the source content for that particular source.

imho it would make harvesting too easy (and more boring as it is now)
i would rather see them fixing forage window so that active forage window stays on top of others.

Originally Posted by keoni

that should heal those wounds completely.

yeah right :-)

... or better yet make it lvl 250 stanza (knowledge 4 or something)

[genod]

I don't have much trouble digging high content spots nowadays, despite prospecting most spots with a zero range lvl 2 angle cone. I've found that clicking on the source info window you're wanting until it shows over the others tends to work in all but the most awkward of spots.

I'll go with what blaah just said as what I'd like to see done.

[altomesa]

What's the point of popping 10 sources if you can't see which one's are worth digging? So, yes, I agree completely. This is a constant point of frustration for me and most foragers and needs to be addressed and changed. I had submitted the idea a while back that they should change the blue bar so that it be scaled from the beginning by how many mats were in the source (i.e. 30 mats = 100% blue bar, 15 mats = 50% blue bar, etc) but admit, I like your idea better Keoni. Here's hoping they see this thread and care enough to take it into consideration.

[vguerin]

I like your idea, but it should be included with Knowledge 3... Anything sooner defeats the purpose of leveling if a level 100 harvester has the same skills as a level 250.

___________________
DoubleTap - Disciple of Jena
Matis Dual Blader & Medium Gladiator Champion (Undefeated)
Member of Team Melinoe, Matis 5V5 Champions (Undefeated)
Click here to join Melinoe
Ultimate Harvesting Guide
Melinoe - Atys Harvesters http://ryzom.twazz.net/
WWJD - What Would Jena Do ?

[basicart]

Would be a nice add for a lvl 250 Knowlage 4 heh

[marct]

The best option (which I am robbing from someone who posted it previously) is to have the maximum of the source content line be set and then display the content line in being as full as the source is. I believe the maximum quantity in a source is 30. So if you pop a source with 30 in it the bar should be full. If it has 15 it should be half of a bar, etc.

For visual purposes:


Src Content = 30 (bar appears as below)

------------------------------


Src Content = 10 (bar appears as below)
----------


hope you get the idea. I thik the stanza that would be better suited is a Prospect stanza that allows you to

pop sources content > 10
pop sources content > 15
pop sources content > 20
pop sources content > 25

That should do it, and then there are even 4 levels.

Just my thoughts,

Noin.

[rushin]

would be nice if something was done knowledge 4 sounds alright 2 me, but the overlapping window thing should b fixed also otherwise will continue to frustrate